1. Field
The present disclosure generally relates to the fabrication composite structures, and deals more particularly with a method and device for transporting, placing and compacting contoured composite stiffeners.
2. Background
During the fabrication of contoured composite stiffeners such as stringers, a compactor may be used to compact a layup of the stringer against tool surfaces. In some cases, the tool surfaces may be contoured along one or more planes. Compactors have been developed that are flexible along a single plane of curvature, consequently where the stringer is contoured in more than one plane, the tool surfaces have relatively complex geometries that require the compaction process to be performed by hand. When laying up compound contoured composite stringers by hand, wrinkles may form in the laminate plies which gather at various points in the layup and/or undesired fiber distortion may occur. Using hand layup techniques, the location of ply wrinkles and ply gathering is difficult to control, thus introducing variations in the finished part that may affect part performance. Also, the human factor involved in hand layup may introduce process variations that lead to undesired inconsistencies in the finished parts.
Accordingly, there is a need for a method and device for compacting contoured composite stiffeners such as stringers which may consistently and predictably distribute ply wrinkles and gathering in a manner that improves part quality and/or performance. There is also a need for a compactor device that may be used to transport stringers to a cure tool and which conforms to compound curvatures of the stringer during stringer placement and compaction.